


Wearing You Down

by allsorrowsborne



Series: Inaccessible [1]
Category: Killing Eve (TV 2018)
Genre: Angst, Blood Kink, Creepy, Eve Rising, F/F, First Person Villanelle, Genderqueer, Genderqueer Villanelle, POV Villanelle | Oksana Astankova, Smut, Strap Sucking, Strapping, Villanelle's Binder, Villanelle's Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-04-18
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:15:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23247619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/allsorrowsborne/pseuds/allsorrowsborne
Summary: Creepy genderqueer kind of love story, with a deep dive into Villanelle’s mind. With binders, emojis, packing, castration, bullets and tampons, knives and blood, and a dinner date.First person Villanelle woven throughout. Set somewhere in the cracks of S2.
Relationships: Eve Polastri/Villanelle | Oksana Astankova
Series: Inaccessible [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1662610
Comments: 69
Kudos: 195





	1. Ale Decha

_These are the ones I killed, Eve. The ones that made it into your collection. There are others that you don’t know about yet. Come here tonight and I will tell you about them. Come up to my flat and I will show you how._

\---

Eve is standing in front of an iron gate, street level, on a quiet residential square in Earls Court, London, a little removed from the busier streets of the West End. It’s a nice area. Expensive. The trees would be leafy if the season wasn’t wrong, and the sun might cast an orange-pink glow if it weren’t for the clouds. It rained earlier, although not now, and the smell of wet concrete hangs in the air.

She should ring the buzzer, flat 3c, so Villanelle knows she’s here. She should. But she doesn’t.

Her dizziness had started on the escalator when it carried her deep underground to the tube. She didn’t pay it much attention even as it accompanied her onto the train. The northern line did this to her sometimes, flinging her body through darkened tunnels, too tight, too fast, too far down. Claustrophobic if she allowed it. But she’s been riding this line for years now and she’s grown used to the feeling of walls closing in. It always passes when she exits the train. Except today. Today, the dizziness stayed when she changed at the Embankment, intensified as she reached her stop. A challenging task to keep herself upright as she walked the short half mile from the station to here. To Villanelle’s flat. Motion sick without the motion. The familiar stirrings of panic.

It’s OK, she reminds herself. She knows how to manage this. Deep breaths. Interrupting anxiety’s path. Besides, panic is appropriate right now. She’s not overreacting, she’s not being weak. This is a rational response to a ridiculous situation. Approaching Villanelle’s flat alone, at night, because Villanelle sent her that one-word text. She knew what it meant. And she came right away. Coming through on the promise she made, coming when Villanelle called.

\---

_It’s been a shitty week, Eve. I did not like it. Should have killed you for the way you sneered at me, when I was just doing the thing that you asked. Monster versus ghost. Bam! I waited for your thank you, hand fluttering landing on my upper arm, but you gave me a stomachache, pressure building behind my left eye. I do not want those feelings Eve. But you said you would come here and I’m going to trust you. Trust me too. I promise it won’t hurt as much as you think._

\---

How had it happened again, that night in Eve’s kitchen? It was fast for sure, their war of position, waged with fury and excess politeness. A handful of minutes from “can you take your shoes off please?” to “will you give me everything I want?”

And Eve had said “yes” and shaken her head “no” and Villanelle had rejoiced at Eve’s inner conflict, struggling to coordinate body and mind. Palpable. It was like watching her try to pat her head and rub her stomach at the same time.

“Should I tell you, Eve, the thing that I want?”

And that time Eve had said the word “no” and nodded “yes” and Villanelle just couldn’t resist.

“I want you to come.”

She dragged the knife lower, from sternum to stomach to the top of Eve’s pants. Raising an eyebrow, as if she were expecting an answer, though only her statement hung in the air. Eve did her best to stay in the present, to not flash back to the bed in Paris, to not race ahead to future surfaces and all the ways this would come to pass. Villanelle let the moment linger, before pulling away and shrugging her shoulders.

“To my place. For dinner. OK?”

Then she howled with laughter, twice in one night, as confusion, relief, and – wait, was that disappointment? – flashed across Eve’s face. “Asshole,” Eve snapped.

“What?” mouthed Villanelle, feigning innocence. “Did you think I meant something else?” She widened her eyes in fake surprise, brought her hand to Eve’s cheek. “So unprofessional,” she cooed.

“Fuck you.” Eve pushed her away.

“Hmm,” mused Villanelle, as she flipped the insult into an invitation. “Perhaps. But dinner for sure. Next week sometime. I’ll tell you when.” And then she left.

So Eve is now here, resting her head against red-brown brick, trying to calm the turmoil inside. It is appropriate to panic, she’s right about that, but completely unhelpful too. Eve cannot think when she panics. Words and danger lose their meaning. Feelings flood. She’s got to get this under control if she’s going to get through this. Dinner that is. And whatever else.

\---

_This is how it happens. I stand. I wait. Fingers drum on windowsill, eager percussion. Watch you arrive. You stop. I stop. Your shape in the doorway. Hair up – why? – neck sweat prickling, trickles down your back in my mind’s eye. Stomach rising, falling, rhythmic. Sweet Eve and your quest for control. Throat swallows. Mine._

_You know that I’m watching, I can see that. You know so much, at least of things to be known with the mind. I’m watching you always, I’ll watch you forever, but don’t keep me waiting too long. I’ve been waiting all day and it is so boring. I’m getting impatient, foot tap tap. I’ve got so many surprises for you, Eve. Come on up and see what I’ve done._

\---

Villanelle had texted Eve two hours ago. Texting Eve was too much fun. The emojis that stood in for feelings. Hilarious. She had sent one word, “when,” just as she had promised, then a lot of emojis. Lipstick. Smiley face. Knife. Pie. The last one made her think of dessert and she wondered what Eve liked to eat. So many options. So much to try.

But there were other things to take care of first. Things to put on and prepare.

It took her some time to find her binder. She hadn’t unpacked when she moved in here. Carolyn’s people had taken care of all that. Not that there was much left to move after Eve tore through her Paris flat. But some things survived. The stuff in drawers. And that’s where she eventually found it. In the top dresser drawer, stuffed behind the boxes of tampons and bullets. Those boxes! A joke for herself that she never gets to share. Perhaps with Eve though? Maybe tonight?

But first things first. She pulls out the binder and handles it carefully. The material is thick and coarse, rough against her fingers. No softness here. Like underwear from an institution that tries to rob its inmates of sex. But institutions fail, and sex still happens, and damn the binder looks good once it’s on. She pulls it on over her head, fastens the Velcro straps on both sides, distinctive style. Breathes into the squeeze. Taut across shoulders. Tight around ribs. Breasts pushed back harder than any lover dares.

Most days, she doesn’t do this, content with a different kind of sculpting. Expensive bras of smooth materials. Curves. Seduction. Luxuriating in her body’s performance, pleasure, perversity, contradiction worn as her crown. Soft skin, solid muscle. Yielding flesh, immovable will. The spider silk that brings down the plane.

But today is not most days. Today is special. Today Eve is coming to dinner and Villanelle must be in top top form.

_\---_

_I could jump from this window, three stories high, and land behind you, knees, ankles, quiet as a cat. Can you feel it, Eve, the pressure/shape/size of me, flat and firm against your back? I can slip in and out of the smallest spaces. The crack in the doorway. Under the bed. I can swell, expand into the atmosphere, displacing oxygen, taking over your every breath. Breathe deep Eve, and you will taste me. Breathe deep Eve, then come upstairs. It will be a night to remember, if we survive it. I always put on an amazing performance and tonight I’m going to blow the house down._

\---

Once she had fucked a man who had made this permanent. Or she had fucked his girlfriend while he had watched, tied to the chair by the side of the bed. The details are a little blurry. But her memory of his body is crystal clear. He had two beautiful scars where his breasts once were. Nipples shaved down. She had trailed her finger then her knife along the contours, imagining scalpels and stitches in a surgeon’s hand. She would have lingered there longer – who knows what might have happened! – but the girlfriend was waiting and whining, and Villanelle needed to move things along. She much preferred the boyfriend’s low-pitched moans, but his body was hairy and his smell all wrong, so she reluctantly left the scars of his chest for openings and closings of another kind.

Villanelle has no interest in making this permanent. Permanence isn’t really her thing. Besides, she has the only scar she’s ever wanted. Eve’s scar. Everlasting. Three inches below her chest. Waiting for its creator to come.

\---

_I remember them as chunks and noises, mostly, the ones in your collection. Your notes and photographs. I’m not very good at recalling names. I made you a collage of body parts – you know which ones – and you papered them over your wall like posters, with me as the movie star and you as my fan. We met in a bathroom – remember that night? – and I left your side to paint a bloodbath, my “wear it down” words to you fresh on my mind. The one with asthma! I gained entrée with a tampon – I am too funny – I wish you could have heard her wheeze. And I took on your name so I could step into you, feel you from the inside out. “Eve Polastri,” I set it as name-bait and reeled you in and here you are. I think you worry, Eve, but there’s no need. I was with them, yes, but mostly with you. I am always with you. Wearing you down._

\---

Eve will be here soon. Villanelle needs to focus. She puts on a crisp white shirt that buttons flat, considers a tie that hangs straight down. Thinks of another neck that could be encircled, pushes the thought aside for now. Soon.

She walks over to the full-length mirror, opposite the piano. Turns full circle to take herself in. Her top half is perfect. Now for the bottom. Time to finish getting dressed.

The packing dick is easy to find. She remembers where she left it, in that box in the bathroom, safely stashed along with a gun. Her storage humor is truly fantastic. Eve will love it.

She tucks it to the left, inside her boxer shorts, discrete but present against her warmth. She feels it instantly, nerve endings reaching where none had existed, extending beyond the boundary of skin. Are they liars, the ones who say they cannot feel this, cannot sense what lies outside? Or is this another way that she is special, animating non-living objects as easily as she extinguishes life?

Her mind drifts to itches and amputations. Some missing things are hard to scratch. There is nothing missing here, nothing missing in her. Just Eve. The itch. And that will change soon.

She pulls on a pair of tan-colored chinos, slips her hands into the pockets. Tucked tight, bulging slightly. Eve will see it if she looks closely. Eve will feel it even if she doesn’t look. It’ll be bigger later, when Eve gets here. But it doesn’t need to be big right now. Just there. Attached. A pen knife that she can feel through her pocket not a carving knife that peels meat from bone.

_Dicks can be removed, Eve. You know that. Attached. Resized. Brought into life. I have brought you here and I’m waiting to show you the rush of castration turned on its head. It’s not my favorite way to kill. Does that surprise you? Too clichéd for someone like me. One of a kind. But some women overlook the subtle. They need the meaning rubbed in their face. You like dick? Dicks come. And go. Some last longer than others. ~~~~_

She pulls her hair close against her scalp, ties it back a little too tight. Pulls on the boots that ground her like gravity, fingers lacing them swift and sure. The blood pumps hard through her body. She feels and fills up all of her parts.

\---

Downstairs, the rain has started again. It mists Eve’s hair and her upturned face. She glances at the window, knowing Villanelle is watching. She shivers slightly under her gaze.

Why did Eve come here? A dinner date on a weekday evening. Her heart in her mouth. A bottle of wine as a gift in her hand. Walking in like a lamb to the slaughter? Waltzing in to claim her prize? 

It’s been on Eve’s mind every waking minute. It’s been in her dreams with a mind of its own. Her agenda. Her terms. Eve shakes her head at her daring. A new kind of giddy joins the panic, a better feeling, one she could own.

Eve hasn’t thought it through exactly. It’s more of an instinct than a plan. But Eve trusts her instincts. They’ve always been good. Certainly, they have sharpened with age. Eve has got this, if she can just keep breathing.

She presses the buzzer and smiles.

\---


	2. Pen & Ink

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They eat, they talk, they make a mess. With bad wine, bad attitudes, stolen property, and psychological Q&A.

_Ding-dong bell, pussy’s in the well, who put her in, little Johnny Flynn. Don’t worry, Eve. It’s only a nursery rhyme. British parents are so perverse. There are no wells here. No cruel children. Only me and my own brand of love. You ring the bell and my wait is over. I hear you calling. Here I come._

\---

Downstairs, Eve is impatient. Her feet hurt after the walk from the underground. The evening drizzle is turning cold. Maybe she should have worn a sweater, the old green one that her mother sent her years ago for her birthday. Villanelle would hate it. Eve smiles at the thought.

Villanelle is making her wait, of course. Asshole. Eve reaches to press the bell again, but there’s no need. Buzz. Click. The door opens. It is heavier than she expected, but she leans into it, enjoying the push. The temperature shifts as she enters the building and warm air rushes to chase out cold.

It is quiet in the lobby. No voices drift from rooms. A police siren wails somewhere in the distance. The carpet muffles the click of her shoes. Villanelle’s flat is on the third floor. There is no lift. Eve sighs out of habit. It’s actually fine. She’s come this far and she’s here for a reason. Three flights of stairs? Eve can climb.

\---

Villanelle is still by the window. Waiting. Counting. 1, 2. All the way to 54. The number of stairs until Eve reaches her. Her Eve. Will she breathe heavily? Will she sweat? Rain mutes her view of the streets. Nighttime darkness settles in. There are stars in the sky, but she cannot see them, hidden as always by the city’s glare. Villanelle knows this but still she searches for distant star brightness, the kind emitted from something that’s dead.

Footsteps outside. She walks to the door. Doesn’t open it. Eve doesn’t knock. Why move too fast to pull back the curtain, when almost-not-quite is all that they know? Villanelle peeks through the security peephole, hands in her pockets, feeling the pressure, forcing herself to take her time. Slowly slowly catchy monkey. Sees her. Finally. Eve.

Eve stands in the hallway. She can feel Villanelle’s gaze upon her, that puzzling mix of detachment and want. She likes it. To be the subject of Villanelle’s interest. To command her attention and stare right back. Eve knows Villanelle will soon move to encircle her, draw her out, wear her down. Eve can’t stand her fucking arrogance. And still she loves to watch her try.

They stay there for minutes. A game of chicken.

Villanelle breaks first.

“Hi, baby.” She whispers it heavily.

The door is still closed. No need to rush.

“Are you going to let me in?” Eve asks, a little coldly. “Your _baby_ just walked up three flights of stairs and needs to take off her goddamn shoes.”

The door opens. Eve enters. It’s like she’s crossing a fucking threshold, the way that consequence hangs in the air.

“I came,” Eve says, with its multiple meanings.

“Eve,” she replies, because no other words count. 

\---

_I’ve been dreaming of you in tongue twisters, Eve, a tumble of words to rip out a tongue. This is our night, Eve. Our night to get even. Eventually, readily, Eve at my door. We will get even this evening Eve. Even if it kills us to try._

\---

They sit at a large wooden table, wine not opened, food not served. No cooking smells waft from the kitchen. No indicator of the dinner to come. Eve kicks off her shoes. Some mix of comfortable and not giving a fuck. Villanelle rocks back on the chair legs, lacing her fingers behind her head. Her bound chest accentuates muscle, shoulders broadened, stomach taunt. _I like it V_ , Eve thinks to herself, but doesn’t say anything. Villanelle has ego to spare.

They sit in silence, waiting.

“Did you think I would cook for you?” Villanelle laughs suddenly, as if she’s responding to something Eve said. “Reciprocate?” She shakes her head knowingly, fake tut-tut sympathy. “Eve, you should know me better by now.”

Eve sighs, unsurprised. At least she ate those crisps on the way. She reaches for the bottle of wine. “Corkscrew?” 

Villanelle fetches two wine glasses and a corkscrew. She puts it down carefully in front of Eve. A sharp point that is designed to be twisted. As if things are not twisted enough.

Eve picks it up, opens the bottle, and pours herself a glass. Drinks deeply. Cheap wine. She chose it on purpose, a petty fuck you to Villanelle’s taste. It burns a little as she swallows. Perfect.

She pours herself another then remembers Villanelle. Glass still empty. Sorry, babe. Eve fills it for her, splashing the table. She’s making a mess and she doesn’t care.

A phone rings. Villanelle’s. She picks it up, mumbles something, then disappears for a few minutes, returning with two carrier bags. “Cambio de Tercio,” she says. “I think you will like it.” She sets the table with plates and cutlery and sits in the chair opposite Eve.

The tapas are good. Really fucking good. Villanelle ignores the plates, eating straight from the containers, too impatient to walk through the steps. Eve hesitates then does the same. They reach for the peppers at the same time.

“You first, Eve,” flirtatious, chivalrous. “Too fucking right,” hungry, sure.

They eat the rest of the meal in silence, but who needs to talk? There are things to consume and hungers to sate. Villanelle wolfs down the food, a loud messy eater. Eve eats up the way that Villanelle gulps. It’s like they are racing, unrestrained, with no idea of what marks the finish line or what it means to reach there first.

\---

At some point, Eve stops, slurps up the shrimp that drips from her lip. “Dessert?” she asks. She has no interest in hiding her appetite.

Villanelle nods in appreciation. She walks to the kitchen, stops, unsettled. Leans her forehead against the fridge. _I want I want I want I want._ Wonders if she’s going mad.

She returns with freshly sliced apples and honey for dipping. Overkill is hard to resist.

“This is so tacky.” Eve sucks in the sweetness.

“You know that you like it. Admit it, Eve.”

“Oh, I admit it. You got me, baby.”

That thin line between derision and honesty. They rub at it, straddle it, see if it breaks. Trading glances, expressions unreadable.

“Be careful, Eve. Don’t choke on the skin.”

\---

_I’ve been thinking about loving you, Eve, about maybe I might want to give that a try, and see if this fall down blown-out kneecap feeling, shatter stumble, could become something whole in your hands._

\---

“This is nice, Eve. To sit with you. Eating. I usually skip this part. I wasn’t sure I would like it. But I do. It’s different.”

“How?”

Villanelle knows how it is different. It is circles not lines. Stories not flatness. Something other than focus or void. More. She doesn’t know how to explain that to Eve.

“It tingles?” she tries. “It doesn’t stay still?” And when that fails, when Eve looks at her blankly. she turns to description, concrete, literal. Once she starts, it’s hard to stop.

“It is not in a bedroom or a bathroom.”

“It is with someone I know, whose name I remember.”

“It is lifting food to my mouth as you do the same.”

“It is with someone I’m not touching, not fucking, not killing.” She doesn’t say “yet.”

“It is with someone I want to stay for a while.” And then deep breath.

“It is different because it is not easy.” 

“This is hard for you?” Eve’s voice is curious and gentle and Villanelle hates it, wants to stop it and crush it, so she never has to anticipate its end.

There are so many ways she could flip this around. _Oh, it’s hard Eve. Feel right here. I’ll show you how hard I am for you._

Instead she sits there, confused.

“Yes.”

Eve takes in her vulnerability. Checks it off like a number on a bingo card.

“It’s nice to be with you too, Villanelle.”

Villanelle’s eyes positively shine.

\---

“Open it, Eve.”

They have finished eating and Villanelle has thrown out the food containers. Keeping leftovers isn’t her style. She has given Eve a small gift box, wrapped in silver with a red bow. There’s childish excitement in her eyes.

Eve is skeptical. She unwraps it gingerly, as if she’ll find a severed hand inside. No. It’s a book, a familiar book, one that she has reread lately, one that she left on the side table in her living room. Why Women Kill.

“What the hell? This is my book! Have you been in my fucking house?”

“You know I go there. Don’t pretend.”

Of course, she goes there. She touches Eve’s things, she sits on her furniture, she shits in her toilet, she inhales Eve’s privacy like perfume. Absorbing her. All the time.

And of course, Eve knows it. She’s felt the traces. The imprint of fingerprints on her clothing, the flick of tongue when she’s brushing her teeth. She likes it. She knows that. But that’s no reason to tell Villanelle. Eve redirects the conversation.

“How the fuck is this a gift?”

“Look inside.”

At the back of the book, there are two sheets of paper folded neatly. Eve recognizes them as the pages she copied from the PCL-R, the psychopathology diagnostic manual.

“You have those for me, yes? You want to ask me? Come. I will let you. That is my gift.”

Eve wanted perfume. Maybe jewelry. But this is much better, and Villanelle knows it. She hates that Villanelle knows her this well. Eve wants to say no just to spite her, but not as much as she wants these answers. Longing for knowledge because knowledge is power, and Eve wants power over her. Over her. Looking down. Fuck. Does Villanelle know this about her too?

“Fine,” snaps Eve, conceding nothing. She snatches the pages out of Villanelle’s hand.

“But we do this my way, OK?”

Villanelle grabs a notepad and pen from the counter and gives them to Eve.

“Take notes. The questions are long.”

“You’ve done this before?”

Villanelle looks at Eve as if she is stupid.

“I castrated my girlfriend’s husband! Everyone wanted to hang out and talk.”

Villanelle – Oksana – Anna – Max. Eve doesn’t know what to do with the thoughts.

“I scored 32 last time, Eve. Pretty good! I bet I can do even better now.”

“You say that like it will impress me”

“You say that like it won’t.”

\---

_I collect you in pieces, Eve, your glances and reactions and I sort them and know them and hold them close. I will give you what you want, lie in your lap in your microscope, and you will see me and want me back, and if your words move too close to bone to fear I can lie and lie and lie._

\---

Eve looks at the first question.

_“Item 20 Criminal Versatility: Review with the examinee their documented criminal charges and/or convictions > 18 (adult rap sheet). Code them by offense categories (see rating booklet). Refer to the rating booklet during the interview (Hare, 1991b). Review other possible offense categories.”_

She remembers why she hates criminal psychology. Ratings and codes. Trying to order chaotic brilliance. Draining the spectacle dry. But at least she learned how to do these interviews. Work through the items in a specified order; paraphrase questions to elicit information; code for indicators of psychopathology; generate a numerical score.

There are no instructions for doing the interview after dinner. When you’ve already stabbed your subject. When you cannot keep your eyes from their crotch.

“The first question is about your criminal versatility.”

“Versatility.” Villanelle repeats it slowly. She leans back in her chair, one arm resting on the table, the other draped behind her back.

“It is good to be versatile, yes?”

And just for a moment, their minds are synchronized, both imagining the same type of sex. Neither believes the other would want it, at least not in that way, at least not yet. Someone is pushing. Someone is falling. Someone is pleading, saying Eve’s name.

Someone swallows.

“Eve. The question?”

What? Oh yeah.

“What crimes have you committed since you were 18?”

No need to ask about charges and convictions. She’s never been caught, except by Eve, who sits with bare feet under the table, a half-empty wine glass near her hand. Capture takes many forms.

“Boring. Unless you want details? Smells, sounds? Maybe the blood?”

“Fine,” says Eve. Is she really that obvious?

Villanelle smirks. Cannot resist.

“Excellent. I will tell you about Frank.” 

“Eww. Frank? God no. Way to spoil the mood, Villanelle.”

\---

_“Item 12. Assess the presence and frequency of early behavioral problems…”_

Blah blah. Eve cuts through the bullshit.

“When you were a kid, what trouble did you get in at school?”

Villanelle brightens.

“Have I told you about Maria Ivanov? Ugly sweater, lumpy hair? I will give a fantastic answer. I won’t just tell you. I will show you how. Pen please.”

She holds out her hand expectantly. Eve rolls her eyes and passes the pen.

“I was 8 or 9. School was boring. I would daydream. Sometimes I doodled. Spirals mostly.”

Villanelle uncaps the pen and swirls the thin red nib around in the notebook.

“I liked to trace body parts too. To see what they would look like detached. Sometimes, I did my feet and forearms. One time, I tried to trace my head. But mostly my hand.”

She places her hand on a new blank page, draws around her fingers then lifts them away. It reminds Eve of a childhood craft project, a trace-the-hand thanksgiving turkey she made at school. She tries to picture Villanelle at that age.

The red ink in front of her morphs into crime scenes and all she can see is a bloody handprint, the chalk outline of a body felled.

“Eve?”

Villanelle nods at the paper, looks expectantly. Is she really asking for Eve’s hand? She thinks of Bill, hours before Villanelle killed him. Say yes to everything. The thoughts coexist easier than they should. She puts down her hand and waits.

“Spread your fingers.”

Eve does as she’s told. Slots into spaces between Villanelle’ fingers, filling the emptiness on the page. Villanelle traces around Eve’s hand, silently. ~~~~

“Sometimes I would write on myself.”

The pen moves to the back of Eve’s hand. Villanelle raises an eyebrow, waits for the nod that comes quickly, stopping as the pen snags on skin.

“Make a fist.”

Eve curls her fingers, folding them under, pulling the skin taut across bone. The pen moves easily as Villanelle draws a heart. An arrow right through it. E & V written too small, the ink bleeding, the letters blurred.

“Turn it over.”

Villanelle follows the radial artery, over Eve’s forearm, humming low.

Eve watches, disoriented. Is it childish? Is it disturbing? With Villanelle, are they the same?

“What are you doing?”

“Telling a story.”

“You’re not saying anything.”

“I’m not? Hmm.”

The pen crosses Eve’s cubital, sliding higher to her short-sleeved shirt. Villanelle pushes the sleeve up, business like, a medical assistant preparing a shot.

“I stabbed Maria with a pen in the neck. In and out. So many times! A fountain pen, Eve. The ink went everywhere. Such a mess. Take off your shirt.”

“No.”

Eyes meet. They speak politely, matter-of-fact.

“But I can do this?” Fresh red spirals over newly exposed skin. ~~~~

“Yes”.

‘Do you want to ask more questions?”

“Yes.”

“I can do this while I answer?”

“Yes.”

Ink travels down Eve’s arm.

Eve considers what to ask. _Can I kiss you? Will you cut me? Can I rest my head on your chest?_

“Why did you stab her?”

It had to be said, to get it over with. The question that hangs over both of their heads. It has nothing to do with Maria Ivanov.

“I stabbed her because I did not like her.”

Villanelle glares. Eve is silent. Both know what comes next.

“You stabbed me because you do.”

The memory gets lodged in Villanelle’s shoulder blades. She sits up abruptly, drops the pen. She leans back in the chair and folds her arms protectively over her chest. _That’s not for you Eve_. _Not now_. Sulking. Hurt.

\---

_I am slipping and stuck in falling Eve and I cannot find my landing ground. You are supposed to give me flowers and gifts like I give you and you don’t ever do that, do you? You said you were a blade of grass in winter, all promise and moment, and you sliced through my finger and gave me bloodied snow. I want to leave you, Eve, go back to greyness and blunted touch and flat foot sureness but I cannot stop the slipping. I need to end this, Eve, I need to end you, and I cannot and I have never felt cannot before._

\---

“Let’s stop.”

Eve doesn’t want to continue the questions. Villanelle is distant, emptied. Eve doesn’t know how to sit with the ache. She wants to run back to the hallway outside, a door between them, a barrier that lets them be close.

“You are still here, Eve. Ask.”

“Fine.”

She looks at the paper. _“_ _Item 17. Short-term sexual relationships. Record number…”_ Seriously?

“The next question is about sexual relationships.”

Villanelle sneers. “Perhaps you will like this, at least. I am very good at sexual things.”

“How many sexual partners have you lived with for more than four weeks?”

“Lived with? Stupid. Why would I do that? Next.”

“How many sexual partners have you lived with for several days at a time for a period of six months?”

“None. These are shitty questions. Next.”

“Have you kept clothes at a partner’s house?”

Finally. Villanelle finds safe ground.

“I have clothes at your house. I touch them when you’re not home. I smell you on them, Eve. Do you masturbate when you wear them?”

“I don’t wear those clothes.” A kneejerk lie that neither believes. 

Villanelle smiles in spite of herself. “Liar, liar, pants on fire.” What she would give to lie with Eve.

\---

Eve skips a question about house keys. What’s the point? Villanelle enters whenever she wants.

“Have you ever been sexually unfaithful?”

“I don’t know!” Villanelle looks bewildered. Hesitates, then asks Eve. “Have you?”

Good question. “Define unfaithful.”

“This. Us. Me and you.”

Villanelle picks up the corkscrew, fiddles with it nervously. Eve sighs. Who fucking knows?

“This isn’t – we haven’t – we haven’t touched.”

Villanelle laughs at Eve’s logic. She gestures to the red marks on Eve’s arm.

“What about that?”

“You drew on me!” Ridiculous when she says it out loud.

“And what about this?” Villanelle leans closer, brings the corkscrew to Eve’s skin. “I’ve touched you here,” cold metal against her collarbone. “And here,” snagging on clothing as it slowly moves down.

So familiar. So fucking gentle. Closing the distance. Returning from hurt. Eve puts aside fear and desire. Floods with relief to have Villanelle back. Performing. Present. Hers.

“We’ve got a thing for kitchens, Eve! Remember those knives?”

Almost nostalgic, although it was recent. Then presses the question. “None of that counts?”

Eve answers slowly. “It wasn’t – ”

“Wasn’t what?” Villanelle is impatient. “It wasn’t what you wanted? Wasn’t enough?”

“It wasn’t your skin.”

Villanelle pauses, caught off-guard.

“What are you saying, Eve?” She’s smiling now, a mix of incredulous and intrigued. “If you don’t feel my skin, it doesn’t count?”

Eve has no idea what she’s saying. This whole conversation has spun off the rails. But Villanelle is thinking, brilliance in motion, and Eve needs to be in her crosshairs again. She waits for Villanelle’s next move.

“No skin. No touching. I can work with that, Eve, if that’s what you need.”

“How?”

Villanelle gestures grandly to herself.

“I’m a psychopath, I am very creative. More than your books will ever understand. Can I show you how I feel things, Eve?” _Please please please please._ “How to feel beyond skin?”

Eve sighs again at the pretentiousness. Young and beautiful and so full of shit. But Villanelle is here, and Eve is curious, and once she is curious, there’s no going back.

“Yes,” she says clearly, nodding firmly. Something heavy shifts in the room.

“Wait there, OK? I’ll be right back.”

Villanelle quickly strides to the bathroom, knocking over a vase as she goes.

\---

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was hard to write! Let me know if you like it and thanks for reading.


	3. Jouissance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Knife play, mindfulness and some kind of kiss.

\---

It might be a moment out of time, off to the side. Of this world and not. Some place where the rules don’t apply or exist only to move it forward, make it happen, one time at least. It won’t be repeatable, not like this. Nothing is. A moment is once and gone. For once, they choose to take the moment.

\---

They stand in the kitchen, a few feet apart. Villanelle has a knife in her hand. Eve stands with her back to the fridge. The way it has to be.

They didn’t start with the knife. They started with a finger. And Eve’s irritation at a stupid game.

Villanelle had returned from the bathroom with a cedar box and a shit-eating grin. “Sit with me, Eve.” She had put the box next to the sofa and invited Eve to play a game. Villanelle had then closed her eyes and waited for Eve to reach for her nose, not quite touch it, so she could sense its’ approach. Feeling beyond skin. Right.

“That’s your psychopath superpower? It’s a fucking kids’ game!”

Eve was an asshole. She always was. Villanelle loved it more than Eve knew.

“I think you want something more than my finger. What should I use? A gun? A knife?”

No contest. They had moved to the kitchen. Each willing the other to not fuck this up.

\---

“Stand here, Eve.”

Villanelle gestures toward the fridge. She resists the urge to rearrange Eve’s body, remembering Pamela evoking Eve. Echoes of women through time.

She shows her the knife. It’s not from the kitchen, for cutting apples. Nothing domestic. Short white handle. Wide flat blade. Five inches that taper quickly. Sharp.

“Is that –” Eve starts, but she doesn’t finish. _What I used on you? What you used on Bill?_

“I have lots of weapons, Eve.”

Eve shifts her weight, nervous, self-conscious. Waits for the game to begin.

\---

“Close your eyes, Eve.”

In darkness, Eve pretends that she is invisible. _I cannot see you, you cannot see me._ In darkness, consciousness moves through her body, finding and probing the edges of skin. In darkness, it is easier.

Her senses are sharpened. She hears everything. Villanelle’s breath as it drags in her chest, fabric rustling. An arm extending past her ear. The fridge hums. A sticky hand squeaks against its surface. A boot heel shuffles on tiled floor.

“Where’s the knife, Eve?”

The smell is almost too much. Perfume first, but also sweat, slightly sour, vinegar-wine. Bleach. Pepper spice on Villanelle’s breath. Leftover food in an open bin.

“Feel for it, Eve.”

The hairs on her arms. Goosebumps. Static in the air. Gravity tugging on joints. Fluid in her ear. Synapses firing, jumping erratically. She tries to concentrate. Connective tissue, stretching beyond. Inside/outside. Blurring the line. She feels it. Like electricity passing through water, a shocking buzz on untouched skin.

At her throat. Where else? Eve opens her eyes.

Villanelle is focused, statue still. A body-shaped void from the Pompeii ruins, volcanoes erupting inside.

\---

_Come with me Eve in and out of emptiness, you will like it I think, in emptiness you can see everything lose nothing just feel the shocks. Meet me there, Eve, come find me in nothingness lie in my emptiness and maybe your presence can make me more._

\---

Villanelle doesn’t pull back the knife. Eve doesn’t ask.

“There is something I want.”

“Yes?”

“I want us to be even.”

Eve should laugh. There is no even, not in this universe. No equivalence. All is odd. But not all pleasure is found at the ending. Sometimes pleasure lies in the trying, when mess is embraced and needs overlap. Sometimes that is all there is. 

“Oh yeah?” Eve asks, goading, flirting. “What do you want to do?”

Villanelle pauses. Nobody asks that. Not even her. Her desires arise and are met in the moment, ever changing, here then gone. Recently some have started to linger, morphed into longing, a drag to the future that’s completely new. But right now, the pull is familiar. Immediate, where she feels most at home. She is home. Eve is here. Her knife is at Eve’s throat.

“I want to cut you.”

The words out loud, not just in their heads.

“Just a little, OK?” Villanelle continues, nodding, cajoling. Like a kid who wants to stay up past bedtime, seeing how far she can push her luck. She touches Eve lightly with the tip of the knife, right above the swell of her breast.

“Here. Where it is safe.”

Nothing is safe. Not with them. Major arteries can be avoided, but there are bigger dangers than bleeding out. Eve will survive this. And then what? She knows the risks. The probabilities. But whoever said that Eve wants to be safe?

“Yes?” Villanelle prompts, unnecessarily. The same word has already left Eve’s lips. She freezes. Unexpected. The aftershock of Eve’s consent. Recovers quickly.

“Undo your shirt.”

Eve does. She slips it slightly over a shoulder. It’s tight against her upper arm. Villanelle stares. The space between breasts where skin darkens. A mole at her collarbone. A skin tag visible under her arm. Places where she aches to kiss. Eve stares back. Certain.

“Do this.”

Eve does as Villanelle shows her, using her thumb and forefinger to stretch her skin tightly. She sees the red ink on the back of her hand, smudged now, the blur of an arrow through a hazy heart.

She breathes deeply. The same technique she uses for panic now navigating a different storm. Each breath noticed. In. Out. Lungs working their constant exchange. Take in, transform, let go. Nothing taken for granted.

“You are beautiful, Eve.” She says it with reverence.

And cuts.

Eve gasps. Tumbles headfirst into sensation. Tugging, burning, something washed clean. She swears she can hear it, slow-motion tearing, layer and layer of skin. Blood rises, meets the air in salty sting. She wants Villanelle’s mouth – not _there_ , but _here_ – where desire runs red and starts to drip. She must have said something out loud, because Villanelle smiles, radiant. Shakes her head.

“One more, OK?”

Eve’s hand stays steady, head exploding. Villanelle cuts another line.

A small red V.

It’s not too deep, at least not physically. It trickles not streams. Bleeds and stops. Villanelle flips the blade and uses the dull side to collect droplets. Red on silver, shimmering, rolling, the mercury of moving want.

Eve leans forward and licks.

They should cover the cut to keep it clean. They don’t. Future healing is far from their minds. Something much deeper buzzes between them, demands attention. It pulls hard. Villanelle leans in, so fucking close, voice shaking, head hammering, mumbling confessions into Eve’s ear.

“I want you too much.”

Eve absorbs it, urgent, unwieldy. She rises to match it.

“Too much of this? There’s no such thing.”

\---

Somehow, they separate willingly. committed to their strange set of rules. A framework that lets the chaos swarm. No skin, no touch. So many ways to work within it, a game with a million ways to cheat. Blurring the line of I and it, subject and object, flesh and thing. Even Villanelle doesn’t get bored.

“We are even, Eve. I didn’t think you’d let me do it.”

“I didn’t think you had the nerve.”

“Cute, Eve! Let’s celebrate.”

Villanelle grabs champagne from the fridge.

“I still won’t drink your shitty wine.”

She shakes the bottle and pops the cork, bottle wedged between her legs, foam erupting over the floor. “See how happy you make me, Eve?”

Villanelle is giddy. She drinks from the bottle, hiccups, giggles. “Bubbles, Eve. They went up my nose.”

Eve tries to grab the bottle, but Villanelle is quick and holds it high. Eve jumps, grabs it, pulls it down, with Villanelle still gripping tight. Eve is strong. She tips the bottle toward her mouth and drinks from it in Villanelle’s hands. Sucking, spilling. Clumsy, messy. It drips down her chin, splashes her stomach, shirt still open, cold on skin.

“I could clean you, Eve.”

“Thanks, but I can take care of myself.”

Eve roughly dries herself with her shirt. Villanelle throws back her head and laughs.

\---

_I thought this would be a shipwreck, Eve, destruction and drowning, but tonight is a carnival and we have paid for this ride. A rickety fairground rollercoaster, support beams shuddering, teeth chattering, taking corners at top speed. Off-balance, almost falling, out of our minds. Crash into me, Eve, hip against hip, fall with me through darkened skies. Scream. Squeeze my hand and break my fingers. Then rise with me, Eve, our stomachs lurching, and let’s go around again._

\---

They move to the sofa, drink a little, laugh a lot. An interlude before the next act. A new kind of waiting loaded with certainty. Walking on the edge of delirium, neither needing the other to fall.

“What’s in the box?” Eve is ready.

“Things to touch you with. You can look.”

Eve looks inside. Dildo, harness, gun. Smiles.

“Small gun.”

“Size queen.”

“Show me.”

Villanelle reaches, but Eve stops her. “The gun, baby.”

Villanelle is impressed. And disappointed. She pouts, half playful, half insecure. “You like my weapons more than you like me.” She moves the pistol under her chin, as if she’s going to blow out her brains.

Eve thinks of Anna. Saving the letters. Keeping the chair. Shooting herself while Villanelle watched. The thought is sticky. She cannot shake it. Sex. Death. Always together. The way that romance with Villanelle ends.

Eve cannot tell if she cares.

“Eve?”

“I’m thinking.”

\---

_Stop moving, Eve. You are always time traveling. Sliding back guilt regret, forward worry shame. You make your own anguish. Stay still in chaos. Anchor yourself with anger and appetite, be here in the present, be present with your wildness for me._

\---

“Did you love her? Anna?”

“Really, Eve? I’m trying to have a moment with you.”

“I’m sorry. The gun made me think of her.”

“Your mind is beautiful. Your timing is shit.”

Eve shrugs. Doesn’t care. Villanelle lowers the gun.

“Fine. I loved her. She knew I was special. I treated her well. It didn’t work out. She liked younger women. I turned nineteen and got too old.”

Villanelle jokes. Eve doesn’t laugh. Eve is thinking. _Villanelle loved_.

“A younger woman! Can you imagine? I don’t understand it. Perhaps you do?” 

Villanelle fishes for a reaction, to catch and drag Eve back to her. Eve is still deep in thought. The same thought. _Villanelle loved_.

“Don’t worry, Eve. I have matured. I will only cut off your husband’s moustache. Besides,” she hesitates, searching for traction. “I won’t fall in love again.”

The words don’t come out as she intended. Shaky. Amateur. A second-rate lie.

Eve pounces. Villanelle slipping. The crack in the glass. The place she can push. The memory of Anna leaves.

“You sure?” Eve jeers, feeling her power. “You’ll never, ever feel love again?”

Eve doesn’t want Villanelle to love her. She wants to watch Villanelle come undone. Wide-eyed like a deer in the headlights, lost, bewildered, out-of-her-depth. Sadistic, maybe? Just a little. Everyone gets to be more than one thing. Eve moves her fingers through her hair, knowing how to make Villanelle squirm.

“Wow, Eve,” Villanelle understands. “OK. I will play.”

“I will never love someone older than me.” She picks up the gun as she speaks.

“I will never love someone with amazing dark hair.” Kisses the gun slowly.

“I would never love someone who is scared of me and is not scared of me at the same time.” Uses the gun to reach for Eve’s hair, tries to push it behind her ear.

“I would never love someone who asks me questions because she sees herself in my answers.” Drags it sideways down Eve’s torso.

“I would never love someone who lies in my bed and stabs me and straddles me and pushes her hands deep into my wound, all while I’m saying I liked you, Eve, I really liked you, I really like you still.” Moves the gun to Eve’s hip, finds the spot that mirrors her scar.

“I would never love someone who comes to dinner and thinks she can take me down.” Pushes hard.

Eve grounds herself in Villanelle’s negatives, the reversals that let meaning unfold. Meets her eyes. Matches her power.

“I will never love someone who looks at me the way that you’re looking now.”

\---

“Is it loaded?”

“Eve!” Villanelle sounds delighted. Shakes her head, clearing her thoughts. “No, it’s not loaded. You think I’m insane?”

“Load it. I want to see.”

Villanelle smiles wildly.

“Come. I will show you where I keep them.”

Villanelle practically skips to the chest of drawers. The bullets and tampons she wanted to share.

“Jesus Christ. You keep them together?”

“Duh, Eve. They are the same size. They do things with blood.” She looks at Eve slyly. “They slide into holes that remind me of you.”

She gives Eve a bullet. “Want to load it?”

Eve turns it over in her fingers. She remembers when Villanelle kissed a gun then shot a bullet at her feet. Eve presses the bullet to her lips. Cold and tangy. Kissing back.

“What are you doing?”

Elena’s words in the car that day.

“I’m doing whatever I want.”

Eve loads the gun and hands it over. “Your turn.”

“A loaded gun? So reckless, Eve! I can do anything I want to you now.”

“So, what do you want?” That question again. “I’m here. You’ve got me. Big bad assassin. Tell me what you want.”

\---

Villanelle tells her. Recites her lines, immersed in the script. There’s _pussy_ and _wetness_ and _touching_ and _lips_ and Villanelle’s _very amazing_ skills. She’s played this part so many times, with so many substitutes, so many nights in her head alone.

When does Villanelle get bored? Eve wonders. Already perhaps? Eve listens closely. Aroused, yes, but mostly amused. Bides her time. And then.

“Bullshit.”

Villanelle stops.

“That’s not what you want with me.”

“Eve?”

“Eat pussy? Seriously?” There’s disbelief on Villanelle’s face. “Don’t worry, baby. I’m sure that you’re good.”

Villanelle can’t tell if Eve is joking.

“You do that with everyone, right?” Eve leans closer, cannot resist it. “Even Niko does that to me.” Smiles as Villanelle grimaces.

“Tell me what you really want.”

Villanelle huffs. “I don’t know what you mean.”

She does. She’s lying again. Unconvincing. Mastery slipping away.

“I can help you. I already know. You want me to tell you what to do.”

Villanelle stares.

“I notice things too. Take off your shoes? You do it. Sit down? You do it. The way you look at me when I get angry. The way you step back when I step close. The way you swallow when you feel it. Yeah. Just like that.”

Shit.

Villanelle grasps for a way to flip this. Finds nothing.

“Eve. Don’t. You don’t know what you’re doing.”

“Do you?”

“Eve, please, I’m warning you.”

Eve laughs shortly. “Say that again.”

“I’m warning you, Eve –”

“Not that. _Please_. Say please again.”

“No!”

Fucking emotions. Contradictory. Want. But. Yet. Yes. Villanelle doesn’t know how to sort through this shit. Head pounding, palms clammy, dizziness with no clear cause. ~~~~

“You are such a piece of shit, Eve.”

“Say it.”

Silence.

“I can’t. I can’t give you this.” Panicking now. Drawing a blank. “I don’t know why.” 

Eve moves closer. Kind. Unrelenting.

“You don’t have to give it, baby. I’m going to take it.”

Eve raises her eyebrow, expecting an answer, though only her statement hangs in the air. And Villanelle says the word no and nods her head yes, and Eve just fucking waits.

“Say it.”

“No.”

“I’m not asking. I’m telling you.”

Eve takes the gun from Villanelle’s hand. Puts it aside. It helps.

“Please.” An audible swallow. “Please, Eve. Don’t.”

“Again.”

“Please, stop. Please”

Eve steps toward her, knowing its power. Backs her up across the room. The sofa hits the back of her legs.

“Sit.”

She does.

“You want me to stop?” Fingers move to Villanelle’s pants, belt buckle, button, zip undone.

Silence stretches. Eve waits.

“No.”

Eve leans over, passes Villanelle the cedar box. “Take off your clothes. Put this on.” Smiles, nostalgically. “I won’t look.”

And stares and stares.

\---

_Do you know what you’re doing, Eve? What you’re undoing? Unknitting scar tissue, unraveling coils? You said you would do it, you’d find it and kill it, the thing I most care about and here you are. My inaccessibility, Eve! Do it. Kill it. Reach me, know me, wear me down. I want it I want it, I’ll never not want it. Just stay. Afterward. Please._

\---

“You’ve got a nice body.”

Villanelle wears a binder and leather harness. Nothing else. Her stomach ripples, undulating. A rash at her neck spills over pale skin. Folds of flesh curve over a strap that digs low on her side. Softness. Almost. She leans forward, hands on knees, elbows outward, muscular shoulders broader than hips. Sitting with her legs spread wide, as if to show Eve where to look.

As if.

Eve’s eyes travel freely, taking in whatever she wants. Fingers that can crush a windpipe, thighs to break a lover’s neck. Dick obtained, attached, possessed. Villanelle knows what she’s doing, knows her beauty, knows her strength. She also doesn’t know shit.

She reaches for Eve, eyes pleading. Eve steps back, shaking her head.

“Give me your hand.”

Eve spits in her palm.

“Show me how you like it.”

Eve’s saliva is warm and tacky. Villanelle brings it onto silicone, jolts with pleasure. Nerve endings reach and spark. She spirals her thumb around the tip. Slides her hand down, slow and firm. Curses in a different language. Repeats.

“You feel it?”

“Yes.”

“It’s not your skin.”

“No.”

“Good.”

Eve kneels before Villanelle.

“My turn.”

Eve’s mouth. Turning toxins into sugar, spinning sugar into threads. Honeyed apple. Bloodied blade. Drinking from a tilted bottle. Kissing a bullet that could one day kill. She wanted the taste of sweetness and violence. She wants it again now. 

Villanelle reaches for Eve’s head. Eve knocks her away.

“Fuck you, Eve.” Frustrated. Impressed.

“Soon enough, baby. Close your eyes.” Then adds while her mouth is free. “Go deep, OK?”

Villanelle does. She has no choice. There’s nowhere else for her to send it, the desperation that surges through her, nothing to grab, to push, to squeeze. It promises to break her open, into pieces, into Eve.

Lips. Cheek. Tongue. Throat. Eve takes her someplace where words don’t matter, where consciousness is swallowed whole.

Emptiness and everything fuse into one.

She’s falling forward. Unexpected. Way too fast. Villanelle didn’t see this coming, eyes closed doesn’t see anyone coming, but feels her orgasm rip right through her, laying bare layers and layers of skin.

Eve’s mouth. Villanelle’s dick. A first kiss that was worth the wait.

\---

_You’ve made me look forward Eve and lose my spot in time and I’m thinking about next and tomorrow and some sort of longing and I don’t know what to do with that. You do. You know. Show me how to have it, Eve. I will not feel it as you do, easy and natural, but I will learn it like language and fake it like friendship and practice in dreams, however you tell me, just show me how to have it with you. Again. Always. Please._

\---

Villanelle hears Eve move away. Opens her eyes. She’s by the sink, drinking water. 

“Don’t move, OK? I’m coming back.”

Eve kicks off her pants and underwear, tripping slightly. She keeps on her unbuttoned shirt. She climbs on the sofa and straddles Villanelle. Heat and hardness. No more waiting. Eve lifts her pelvis, reaches down. Takes Villanelle inside. Holds.

Neither moves. Still. Quiet. _Go slow go slow go slow_. Villanelle tilts her hips to meet her. Once, twice. Damn.

“Close your eyes.” 

Villanelle does. She sighs under Eve’s weight in the darkness, hears thunder somewhere in the distance. Learns Eve from the inside out. How she opens. Why she tenses. When she buckles. Where she ends. What she sounds like when.

No more walls, only membrane, Villanelle moving through.

Time passes, slow at first. Every second for the taking. Something builds. Accelerates.

Eve shifts position, faster, louder. Villanelle chases. Abdomen aches. Eve reaches down, finding friction, helping herself. Villanelle swears.

“Shit, Eve. I need to see you. If you don’t let me watch, I will kill you, I swear…”

“How?” Eve’s voice is low and urgent. “Make it good and I might let you watch.” 

Impulse and images turn into words, spoken aloud, at last.

_I will kill you Eve with knife and stomach and doing it your way, whatever you tell me, push it in slow to hurt you the most and knuckle deep and drenched in blood and picking up speed and finding a rhythm and in and out to the beat of the bass on a Berlin dance floor and never stopping or pulling out quickly just staying forever pushing in harder and hurting you so fucking much and you have my hand and you guide me through it using the knife however you want and you find the angle and now you are screaming, spasming, crushing every nerve in my body, crashing down, your hair on my face, your eyes on the line of life and death, I’m killing you Eve, I’m killing you always shit fuck please_

“Please.” They are close, so close together. Villanelle needs to see her.

“No.”

And Villanelle’s words disappear into nothingness, she hears someone cursing, crying, two voices together, an even number, shattering as she comes with Eve.

The thought of killing. The sound of no. All the waiting. All the doubting. It wasn’t that hard after all.

\---

Eve rolls away, laughing loudly. Villanelle swears, wiping a tear.

“Fuck, Eve,” awe and amazement.

“I know, right?” relief and release.

Sometimes you can lean into chaos and sometimes, just sometimes, you can have it all.

\---

Eve stays the night. She stays the next day. It’s evening again when she finally leaves. The rain has stopped. The sky has cleared. Villanelle sits at the window and smiles.

Eve walks up behind her, reaches arms around her stomach. She rests her chin upon Villanelle’s shoulder. It digs in. Villanelle laughs.

“What are you looking at?”

Villanelle could tell her about dead star light. The cars that she silently wills to crash. She catches Eve’s eye in the window’s reflection.

“I’m always looking at you.”

They stay there a while. Then Villanelle turns.

“It is March 17, Eve. Can you believe it?”

“What the fuck is March 17?”

“It’s two days until spring. My favorite season. Even London might brighten up.”

Eve doesn’t try to follow the logic. She pictures Villanelle dressing for sunshine, the clothes she will wear, the skin she will show. Eve will be there to see it, somehow. An instinct if not a plan.

“I’m going to leave now.”

Villanelle wants her to stay forever, another wish that mirrors Eve’s own. But it’s fine. She is busy too. Places to be. People to kill.

Eve presses her mouth to Villanelle’s neck.

“When will I see you again?”

“Soon, baby. Till next time, OK?”

Next time. The weight will be different. The wait will be easier.

“I’ll see you when the seasons change.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That took a while to finish! Thanks for your patience. Let me know if you liked it and come say hi on twitter @olderthaneve.


End file.
